KMW now also dismantles battle tanks

We’ve written recently about dismantling missiles and explosives and now we hear that Krauss-Maffei Wegmann (KMW) has just acquired Europe’s only NATO-certified battle tank dismantling company.

Aptly named Battle Tank Dismantling GmbH Koch, the company, based in Rockensussra, Germany, was formerly owned by the Scholz Group, a world leader in steel and scrap recycling.

You’ve all seen those photos of row after row of old aircraft stored in the dry desert air in the United States. Well now here’s one of tanks in the not so dry air of Rockensussra, which must be almost the geographical centre of Germany.

Battle Tank Dismantling has been demilitarizing, dismantling and scrapping armoured vehicles since 1991 from German, Austrian, French, and other European arsenals. KMW said in a statement on 25th February that “so far it has destroyed and disposed of some 16,000 military vehicles, including more than 1,800 main battle tanks and roughly 6,000 wheeled and tracked armoured vehicles.”

The new tank dismantling business goes into Honosthor, created by the alliance in December between KMW and French land armaments specialist Nexter.

Tanks waiting their to be turned into scrap metal

A lonesome turret dismantled from the tank being attacked by a welder in the background